Kris Marshall interview
Comedy fans have already taken Kris Marshall to their hearts for his roles as the love-lorn Colin in Love Actually and irresponsible son Nick in My Family. But in Citizen Khan they get to see him in quite a different comedy role, as the sensible and dependable Dave.
Kris describes his new character as follows: "Dave is a white Muslim convert who has come to Islam in the last few years and has just recently taken up the position of the new mosque manager. It's a position he's looking forward to putting his own form of progressive thinking and change to. He's kind and pastoral. Dave is a responsible member of the community but he's not without a sense of humour!"
Although Mr Khan is wary of Dave at first, as the show continues, Dave becomes more and more part of the Khan clan. Kris laughs "Dave becomes an almost de facto member of the family as the series progresses. He's always on hand to provide care and advice in his own unique way. Although they are initially bemused by each other, Mr Khan and Dave begin to form an unlikely friendship through their shared beliefs but differing interpretation of the future of the mosque in the community."
By playing Dave, who is sometimes the butt of Mr Khan's jokes, Kris has found himself sometimes playing the straight man in the sitcom. "It's tough and quite thankless at times but without a straight man you couldn't have the gags really. They're the maypole that all the crazy characters dance around."
As Citizen Khan is set in Birmingham, Aston Villa fan Kris has had to perfect a Birmingham accent. "It's an actor's job to be able to do lots of different accents so it was just about practice really", Kris explains. "The challenge was not the accent per se, but sometimes with a non-native brummie it can come across as sounding a bit er... stupid! So it was important to try and make it sound as natural as possible. It helps that we have two proper Birmingham persons in our cast."
So how does the Khan family compare to Kris's previous sitcom family The Harpers? "In essence the two families are quite similar. Mr Khan is quite set in his ways and pretty much all of the drama is down to his hand! Khan is a warm family sitcom that is pretty cross-demographic; it's the subject matter that makes it unique. I'd heard of Mr Khan on the grapevine but hadn't heard or seen anything on the TV or radio. Glad to be a part of it though because he's a genius!"
In addition to Citizen Khan, Kris has a busy autumn ahead of him. "I've got two films out later this year, A Few Best Men and Sparks and Embers, more Samuel Pepys for Radio 4 and I'm about to start filming a new drama for ITV... Oh and there's the small matter of imminent fatherhood as well!"